Poison & Wine
by ohyellowbird
Summary: Violet has started college and hasn't spoken to Tate in almost three years. She's taken to drinking and partying to smother her want for him, but in the end, she still lives at Murder House and so does he
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: **Hey everybody! I've been in kind of a funk these past few days and this fic has just been catharsis for me. I don't have much to say right now other than I love you all and keep writing.

This is an AU where Violet didn't die and went on to college.

Enjoy!

* * *

><p>The first time she comes home drunk from a party is just five days after her first day of school - a study session turned kickback at the dorms on campus. Taking three out of four classes in her major, History, meant fast friends and a shitload of reading homework.<p>

It's the end of august, sticky and warm.

A friend waves from her car in the street and drives off.

She works on threading her key into the front door and curses at the broken porch light in a pale green dress and tights layered with black over-the-knee socks.

It takes a few minutes, longer than it ever would sober, but she manages, pushing inside and slinging down her bag. There's not a single light on in the house and she doesn't bother reaching for one.

"Hello, anybody home?" she half-whispers, giggling to herself, kicking the door closed with her heel.

She climbs the stairs on all fours, seeing doubles of her hands and feet, and teeters down the hall to her room on the left.

He watches, invisible, unnoticed, from the kitchen.

It's been two and a half years since she's spoken to him, since he's let her see him, since she told him to go away.

The empty foyer smells like lavender and vodka.

* * *

><p>The second time she comes home drunk is during midterms. She's been swamped with research papers and exams and needed to escape for a while, with her friends, with whiskey and with weed.<p>

He helps her with the door when he hears her keys drop into the bushes. She doesn't even notice.

She walks in with a lit cigarette hanging from her mouth, singing. He doesn't recognize the song. It must be something new, he'd never heard it on her iPod.

Shrugging out of her cardigan and folding it over one arm, she flips on the light switch.

He's gone before her gaze swivels over to where he'd been standing.

It has to be well past midnight. She checks her watch that isn't there, grins down at her thin naked wrist.

"Dad?"

There's no response. He's in bed already, sleeping, didn't bother waiting up. Good.

She stubs out in a decorative vase and stumbles upstairs.

Her eyes are glassy. They burn and she doesn't know why. And if she did she'd never tell.

Who was that standing with her in the hallway? The notion that it was him and that he's back seems little-girl-naive. It's been almost three years.

Even so, she still ends up crying herself to sleep under the privacy of her covers, her high flipped upside down by shamed and sudden hope.

* * *

><p>She lives with her dad at Murder House now. Her mom fled years ago, six months pregnant with twins, to her sister's place back east. She promised she'd come back, that she'd send for Violet in the very least, save her from the house and everyone trapped inside it - she never did. She hasn't called in months.<p>

The night Vivian left was the night she found out what he did, how many people he'd hurt, how many lies he'd fed her. It was embarrassing how easily she'd swallowed them, how he had manipulated her into thinking he was some lost soul, fragile and oblivious.

She'd found him curled up in her sheets and watched him collapse into devastation as his sins were brought to light and counted.

She told him she loved him. And then she told him to go.

Sometimes, on what she's deemed 'bad days', she'll step into the spot where she'd stood the last time she'd seen him. She stands there and tries to picture him, his wild hair and his handsome face, all broken sobs and shining eyes. She reworks their conversation in her mind.

Some days she wishes it had never happened. Others she wishes he never had.

* * *

><p>The next time she comes home drunk, only a few nights later, she falls asleep on the couch with her hand in a bowl of popcorn and the t.v. on.<p>

He steps into the faint light of the looping DVD menu, taking in how tired she looks, purple half-moons under each eye, like she hasn't slept in weeks. She has. He would know. His shape is moulded into the corner chair in her room.

"Violet."

His voice is a shaking mess, her name choked out in three syllables instead of two.

She's got a test in Biology tomorrow, a big one if her frantic studying is anything to go on, one she can't afford to miss.

She doesn't stir, just makes a little sleep noise and rubs her cheek into the cushion. It knots his guts into balloon animals.

The light from the television burns bright upon her face. She looks older. Her features are more defined. Her hair is longer, darker blonde, almost brown. It suits her.

When he gathers her in his arms and carries her up to her room, her breath smells sharp and antiseptic and her hair, it smells like cologne. It burns through his nostrils like the insinuation burns through the rest of him.

Upon closer examination, he spots a red mark under her ear, the kind that's only ever made by a pair of lips and teeth. The sight is crippling. The color drains from his face and he's queasy and he wants to drop her, jealousy blazing white-hot under his skin. It's the first time he's felt something, really been able to put a name to an emotion, since that day in her room when she tore out his heart.

He wants to drop her but he doesn't, because when he thinks he might, she wraps a sleep-heavy arm around his neck and nuzzles into his collar.

"Why, Violet, why?" he whines out quietly, whispers it, staring down at her face slack with sleep. His is stretched tight in renewed torment, his throat working around words that feel like sludge in his mouth. "I'm sorry, I said I was sorry. Fuck, Violet, I'm so sorry, I don't know what to do anymore, fuck!"

Then, too soon, they're at the foot of her bed and he falls silent, presses his lips into her hair and carefully, so so carefully, lays her out on the sheets, covering her with the blanket she'd crocheted last summer.

He doesn't watch her sleep that night. It's too much. He wouldn't be able to sink into the basement when she woke. He'd want to let her see him, want to talk to her, about anything and everything.

He falls asleep on the same couch she'd been on downstairs. It's still warm from where she'd been curled up on one side and it still smells like her.

* * *

><p>When her alarm goes off and she stretches awake, it's in her bed and not on the couch. Her eyes bounce throughout her room before she's even rubbed at them.<p>

Her heart throws itself against the front of her ribs and she can't breathe. There's no oxygen in the room. It feels like there's an anvil on her chest.

Where is he?

She allows herself a few more seconds of freezing terror and then pulls in a long breath, inhales until her lungs are bursting and exhales slowly through her nose.

It was just her dad. He must have found her when he'd gotten up for work and carried her upstairs.

Only he would never. He didn't give two shits about her anymore. His mind was either on his ex-wife, pussy, or those damn twins. He could hardly remember what days she had class let alone remember to check up on her after a night out.

She leaves for school that day watching the house in the rear-view mirror.

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><p>She doesn't come home until almost four o' clock the next morning.<p>

It's raining outside and she's half-soaked by the time she gets safe inside.

Tate isn't there to secretly greet her. He doesn't think he'd be strong enough to see but not touch, not after the night before.

She's had too much to drink. Her stomach lurches ominously and there are fresh bruises on her neck. After hanging up her scarf and kicking off her shoes, she wanders into the kitchen for a glass of water.

He's been on her mind all day, even after she's convinced herself she'd somehow gotten upstairs on her own - probably just blacked out or something. It's cliche, but drugs and alcohol are the only things that keep him out of her head anymore.

This was supposed to get easier as time went on, not harder.

Once her glass is empty and her stomach has stopped with the somersaults, she tears off a piece of french bread just to be safe and hops up onto a bar stool, swinging back and forth in the seat.

Sucking on a piece of wet hair, she stares out into the dark room opposite the kitchen. It appears empty, but there are a handful of things that could be hiding out under the cover of darkness.

It occurs to her then that, Moira aside, she hasn't seen a ghost in months, can't even remember the last time.

Where'd they go? Were they gone? Was he gone?

She beats her fist against the counter top at the stray thought, wants to bash her head against it too.

"Get out, get out."

Her voice is hushed and self-serving, not a command but a practiced mantra.

It doesn't help.

She reaches into her bag and digs for her flask, takes a long pull when she finds it. Then, stuffing the rest of the bread into her mouth, meanders through the dark house and up the stairs to her room.

Once inside, she eases her door shut as quietly as she can in such a state. It clicks and she breathes a sigh of relief, leaning back against it for a second, her head feeling suddenly too heavy to hold. She lets it droop forward, feels the entire world spinning under her feet, can taste the night's bad decisions on the insides of her gums.

Peeling out of her clothes takes coordination she doesn't have access to, but after nearly falling over twice, she's in just a bra and panties, her wet clothes slumped in a pile and bleeding water into the carpet.

Her skin is cold to the touch. She wants in bed, but first she wants music.

The light of her iPod is too bright in the night of her room. She squints and bends over, rolls through songs and songs before deciding to put one of her playlists on shuffle. It's aptly titled 'Fuck It' and she feels like a defeatist when she presses play.

Clambering over her footboard and into bed, she lifts back a jersey sheet and down comforter and slinks inside. pulling the blankets up to her chin, watching her iPod screen dim and click dark.

Sad songs fill her empty room.

She tries to sleep, but can't, just lays there, turns from side to side, wishing she'd pass out already, before she starts thinking of him again or crying.

Fuck.

She goes through the day in her head. That'll tire her out.

The Civil War test went well, she scored maybe a low B at the worst - not bad. A few girls tried to get her to pledge for a sorority; she told them she'd rather drop dead. Lunch was fine, a turkey sandwich and coffee from the union, a spliff after. Then there was Anthropology and Ancient World History, then after a short study session, the party.

Her fingers trace out the sore patches on her skin.

He was an Economics major, tall with black hair and blue eyes, nothing at all like _him_. She'd met him once before, a classmate of one of her friends. They'd shotgunned hookah together and played beer pong. She'd let him kiss her then, resigned herself to the idea. But tonight, too much booze and desperation got him under her shirt - she had a bruise blossoming between her breasts to show for it. She would have let him fuck her too. Why not? It's not like she was saving herself for anyone, or at least, she shouldn't be. But before he could corral her back into one of the bedrooms, he'd puked all over himself and passed out. It was pathetic and expected. Only then did she realize it was crowding four A.M. and ask to be taken home.

The song changes and it's into one that makes her wish she'd died taking all those pills Leah gave her.

* * *

><p>Oh your mouth is poison, your mouth is wine<p>

Oh you think your dreams are the same as mine

Oh I don't love you but I always will

* * *

><p>She snorts derisively at the sudden bout of teenage angst, huffs out a wet breath after when her self-deprecation does nothing to keep tears from springing to her eyes.<p>

The mouth on her throat from earlier felt nothing like _his_, too clumsy, not enough teeth. His hands were clammy and shaking, greedy. She can still feel the weight of his palm cupping her through her tights - all wrong. Recalling the experience now made her feel cheap. He'd used her and she let him. Just to feel something, to paste over her feelings for _him_, like she could, like forgetting was an option_._

He would always haunt her.

Wheezing, she turns over and sobs into her pillow, fists the sheets, the revelation stark and honest in her drunken haze.

She'd never be free of him. Even if she moved. Even if she never came back. He's wormed his way so deep inside she's been foolish to think she could ever pry him out again.

He was the darkness that she would forever crave.

She cries and screams until her throat is in ribbons, burning and paper-like, the pillow damp with her tears, and only turns over when she thinks she might hurl, pulls in breath after breath of clean air. Her lips are cracked and the circles beneath her eyes are splotchy and slick.

Her head swims still.

When she opens her eyes she can't see straight, her vision is clouded, the whole room looks like it's flopped over sideways. She stutters out until her chest is no longer wracked and drags herself up onto her elbows, fighting for calm.

It's dark. The curtains over her window are sheer, but drawn. She can hardly make out the grooves on her bedroom door, or the shelves of her bookcase. Her iPod is still singing but lost in the night.

The rain rattles soft outside. She can still feel it. Her hair and limbs are damp and cold.

Her toes are freezing.

She's all alone.

There's an ache between her thighs that just won't settle.

Her blood is 80 proof and she can't think straight.

She wipes her eyes and clears her throat.

"Tate?"

Her voice is hushed and raw and regretful already.

But it's too late.

He's there. Standing at the foot of her bed in a sweater and jeans. It's deja vu. He likes birds too.

She blinks at him through the dark and follows as he walks around to the side of her bed and looms down.

She can barely make out his face but the light catches on his cheeks and she can see that they're streaked.

'Violet-"

"Don't."

He flinches and buttons his lips, his hands pushed into the bottoms of his pockets, anchored down.

She can only half-believe he's really there, wonders if maybe she's already dreaming, if this is just some fucked up trick being played out by her aching subconscious.

The playlist ends and the room fall into a heavy quiet.

She turns her face to map out his features with her eyes and he leans down for a kiss.

"Don't!" Her voice is frantic and too loud for five AM. A tear slips down his face and pecks her on the cheek.

"Don't kiss me," she tries again, forces her voice into a calm she doesn't feel.

He doesn't move, sways on the spot and searches her face. It's obvious there are a hundred apologies clawing up his throat. He's drowning in them. But she doesn't care, that's not what she wants, not now.

"Touch me."

It's a plea, not a request.

He nods and rolls his lips over his teeth, one hand flipping down her covers.

The hickie settled in the valley between her breasts greets him. He chokes out a noise like an audible splinter and looks back to her face, his expression a study in heartbreak.

She can't meet the accusation in his eyes, lets her eyelids droop instead. Then there are fingers circling the purpled betrayal, trying to erase it maybe, she doesn't know. They sweep up her sternum and graze either side of her throat. Her breath hitches and she reminds herself it's all just a dream, it's gotta be.

Another hand pushes the damp hair from her forehead and combs it back. She arches up from the bed.

His breath is too far away to be warm, but she feels it wash out against her skin and she feels it swell when a broad palm smooths down the length of her stomach and cups her through her underwear, just like she wants, just how she's been imagining it. His fingers knead and tease. They slide and coax and because it's all a dream, she lets herself rut against them, doesn't even try to smother the want and need in every little noise that pours out.

It's heaven.

She forgets to keep her eyes closed.

They lift open.

He's there, watching her, his face heavy with some unnamed emotion, and his fingers hook into the crotch of her panties.

Tears rush down her cheeks.

He pauses, unsure.

"Don't. Don't stop."

She steels herself and closes her eyes, wants to just feel, but his face is burned into the back of her eyelids.

The pad of one finger traces up her bare slit and she loses it.

She throws an arm over her face and breaks into sobs.

"Go away."

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><p>He spends the next day alone planning his speech. When she gets home from school, he'll knock on her door and ask if they can just talk. He'll explain everything, why he shot up his school, why he lied about it. He'll tell her about Nora, assure her that the only reason he killed the gays and slept with her mom was to give the poor woman a baby. He had good intentions. Really, he did. He'll get her to see. She'll understand.<p>

Midnight comes and goes and she doesn't come home. But it's okay, he can wait. He will wait. Forever if he has to.

At half past two there's a noise at the door. He phases into the kitchen and waits.

Now's his chance. She'll see. He'll make her understand.

But she doesn't come home alone.

She's with a friend, that girl he's seen dropping her off. Her jeep is parked in the driveway and they're both giggling into the kitchen for a snack.

Well, fuck.

They stay downstairs for forty-five minutes, eating ice cream and watching cartoons, all vodka breath and bloodshot eyes. Since when did she become such a junkie?

Was it his fault?

That's a stupid question. He knows.

When they stagger upstairs and into her room, she swings the door shut and they fall into bed.

Thrumming with crippling disappointment, he settles into the chair in the corner, invisible, and pulls up his feet.

They wriggle under the covers and talk about boys - she doesn't mention him. She's clearly uncomfortable with the topic and cuts it short the best way she can. She rolls onto her side, her eyes heavy and her mouth quirked up in a smile, and she kisses her friend.

He bites into his fist to keep quiet.

It's two girls kissing. It should turn him on, but it doesn't. It's torture. He's jealous.

They make out and laugh until they're tired and then they pass out.

He sleeps in the chair and pulls at his curls.

* * *

><p>She doesn't come home the next night. Or the one after that.<p>

He overhears Ben on the phone with her. She's staying on campus for a few days, crashing at her friend's dorm, they've got a huge project due.

* * *

><p>It's a week before he sees her again.<p>

It's only eleven thirty. Something must have happened.

She props her umbrella against the wall and unbuttons her coat. It's raining outside, the first winter storm of the year. There are wet leaves in the foyer. It's almost Thanksgiving.

She takes the stairs two at a time, only a little buzzed, and toes off her shoes in the hall.

When she takes off her coat, hangs it over the back of her chair, he sees why she's home early.

There are more bruises on her throat. Some are shaped like a mouth but others look like the prints of fingers, ovaled and angry.

It was that asshole. He tried to take advantage of her.

She walks over to her desk and pulls open the top drawer, withdraws a crumpled pack of cigarettes and her trusted Zippo. Her hands are shaking. She can't even light up. She swallows a frustrated scream and hurls them both into the wall, wraps herself up in a hug, wishing she had something to take the edge off her terror.

Wait.

She does.

He's there as soon as she speaks.

The facade of indifference shatters and she collapses against his chest. He holds her in the dark of her room and strokes the back of her head while she cries and clings.

He's here. She's safe.

She clutches at the backs of his ribs. Mr. Economics wanted to fuck and she'd told him no. After what happened with Tate she felt sick letting anyone else touch. But apparently that simply wasn't an option. He'd shackled her neck in his hands and forced his hand down her pants before someone walked in. Two guys from the party threw him off and gave him matching black eyes. They held him tight while she kicked him in the chest and the balls. She walked all the way home, couldn't even ask for a ride.

"I want you to kill him," she chokes out between sobs, wiping her nose against the front of his shirt.

He nods and tells her to bring him over tomorrow, promises that he'll make it hurt.

His darkness, she'd shamed him for it before, but now it served a purpose. No one would ever hurt her again.

She lifts her head up from his chest and smiles, but it's broken. It tugs at something inside him, seeing his brave girl terrified like this.

He wipes her cheeks with his thumbs and leans down when she tilts up her face.

* * *

><p>They kiss, slow and careful by the door, and then more hurried as he walks her back to the bed where they shed their clothes and burrow under the covers.<p>

But they don't frot or fuck that night. He presses his chest to her back and curls his legs into the crook behind her knees, his chin hooked over her shoulder.

He asks about what classes she's taking, how her day went before the party, what college was like. She tells him, her fingers finding his, and she cries a bit more and then she calms and they sleep.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: **This might be my last fic for a little while. I start up school on Monday and I'll see what my workload's going to look like this semester, but I promise I'm not done with Violate, writing or reading. I might sequel this if a new plot bunny comes along, or I might just keep it as a one-shot. Either way, thanks for reading!


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: **A wild sequel appears! I don't know what happened. My boyfriend left for work and I put on RainyMood[DOT]com and two hours later this existed.

Enjoy!

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><p>It's hard to keep quiet with the weight of him pressing down on her, his chest molded to her spine and his hips sharp against her backside. She's arched up on her elbows and her knees and he's a babbling mess between her shoulder blades.<p>

"I love you," he murmurs into her sweat-slicked skin, his grip leaving her waist to trail up her sides and arms, to find her hands fisted into the sheets and slip his fingers between the gaps.

* * *

><p>It's winter break and she's between semesters, trapped at home for six weeks. Christmas and New Year's have passed without much fanfare. She spent the latter at a friend's party and, when the ball dropped, kissed a boy she hardly knew, just because it was tradition and not because he had blond hair and dark eyes. His name was Thomas and she let him fuck her in the guest room. He was too drunk to be gentle, but honestly, she didn't mind.<p>

She came home still buzzed and wearing bruises and woke up thirsty just before sunrise to find _him _curled in her chair and crying. They were silent tears that tumbled down his cheeks and left wet streaks behind; he always did cry pretty. Rolled up onto one side with her hand beneath the pillow, instead of telling him off or just turning her back to him, for a little while she just watches. Watches his lips tremble and listens to the wet breaths he draws in. She wonders sleepily if this is simply ritual or something more , if she really looked that fucked out when she stumbled inside and locked the door, if he could smell that guy all over her or if just the patches on her throat were enough to go by.

She never did bring home that guy for Tate to kill, even though she wanted to. She'd toy with the idea during class, watching him from the corner of her eye, trying to imagine what he'd look like with a slit throat or no head at all. But in the end she'd come to the conclusion that having him killed would only make her more like Tate, and while a part of her craved that, she knew that in the end it would only be another step towards being trapped inside that house forever. If she let herself love Tate she would never leave; she believed this with startling conviction. In a moment of stupidity or weakness or blind passion or whatever the fuck she'd later deem it, she'd end up killing herself for him and then it would be curtains on her life. She'd never be a college professor like she'd dreamed of and she'd never get married or have kids or see the world or anything, really, outside of Murder House and its forever residents.

So in the wake of this mid-lecture realization, Violet calls Tate to her that evening and asks him to please just stay away, tells him that whatever happened before was a mistake, that she's sorry but she doesn't want to see him, that she _can't _see him. Her voice is thick with emotion by then and of course he's already in tears, but still she holds her ground and just nods over his shoulder toward the door when he begs for an explanation.

He goes, but not before her composure shatters and she lets out that aching whine that always precedes a nervous breakdown.

It's not that Violet doesn't love him. She does. She fears she always will. It's just that she loves her freedom more. She's already spent the worst few years of her life under that roof and the idea of spending an eternity more ensnared within those walls is enough to send her fleeing.

She loves him, but she's strong. When her attention is snagged by the glimpse of blond hair or a striped sweater, she diligently steers herself in the opposite direction and seeks out a welcome distraction - which has largely been and continues to be anything that will get her fucked up enough to forget, if only for a little while.

Just a few nights after New Year's, new beginnings and resolutions still popular conversation, Violet showers and shaves for a birthday party at the dorms. She'd declined at first, but had been lured in by the promise of cocaine. The guest of honor was a dealer and word was he'd shelled out enough cash for a bartender. These two factors had her mumbling a tempered, "fine," into the phone and trudging out into the hall to start the shower.

When her hair is clean and dry, she lets her towel drop and slips into a knee-length dress, strapless and petal-pink, pairing it with some deep brown tights and fawn-colored booties and is out the door before her father can bumble down the stairs or call out to ask where she's going.

By the time she gets there, the party has spilled out of its designated dorm and into the halls. Students litter every wall, either chatting animatedly or making out. She steps over someone searching the carpet for an earring in the doorway and immediately gravitates towards the man flipping bottles in the kitchen. With the barest amount of small talk he's pouring her a double Cape Cod and asking about her major. Frankly, it's pathetic. He's got to be in his mid-thirties. So raising her glass in thanks, Violet twirls away from the kitchen island and seeks out an empty cushion on the couch.

Thomas is there and he waves for her attention, but she pretends she doesn't notice and strikes up conversation with the girl sitting to her right. She's not sure why she turns away - it's not that he was a bad lay or that he wasn't handsome. Still, she cloaks herself in chatter with the pretty Bio-Chem major.

Before too long someone unveils a few grams of coke and everyone scrambles to clear off the coffee table. She watches as a small baggie is carefully ripped open and poured out onto the glass right before her eyes, meticulously cut with major credit cards and split up into a long row of even lines.

After the birthday boy, it's ladies first and Violet bends to line up a rolled twenty with her nostril. A few other girls do the same and like some synchronized swimming team they all disappear a thick strip of white at the same time, sniffling and rubbing at their noses as they fall back against the cushions to welcome the burn.

Violet doesn't get home that night until the entire block's sprinklers have kicked on. She hitches a ride from someone that lives nearby, a friend of a friend, and sprints through her front yard to get out of the cold and into the house, getting half-soaked in the process.

She leaves wet footprints in the foyer and wretches off her shoes before climbing the stairs. It's eerily quiet but she's got enough coke in her system still not to care or wonder who's watching her from the dark of the house.

She enters the bathroom first to pee and wash her face, watching the black from her makeup swirling down the drain before staggering back out into the hall. Her dad is snoring two doors over, but it's not his lung condition that's on her mind when she walks over the threshold into her room.

Tate is leaning at the edge of her bed, facing her, propped against the footboard and even in the poor light from the window she catches his eyes as they rake down her body, hunger and desperation warring in his face. He's trying to gauge whether or not she got fucked while she was out. He's pulling in lungfuls of air to catch the scent of cologne and searching her skin for bruises and all she can do is stand there and sway a little.

He looks rough, like he hasn't slept in days. His hands are shaking where they're gripped around the iron wrung of her footboard. There's a slight shadow to his jaw that shows he hasn't shaved and she takes a beat to wonder why she'd never seen him with stubble before.

"Hi Violet," he murmurs in the dark, silhouetted by the moonlight from her window. It might be threatening if it weren't him, but even after everything she knows he'd never hurt her. He'd rather hurt himself. Come to think of it, the sleeves of his sweater look crusty and discoloured. When did he split his veins wide open? Was it while she was out? Is that what he does when she's away?

In the moment before he moves she feels her buzz being sapped , feels the frantic beat of her heart over the woozy high in her head and knows that it's not some outside influence that keeps her from pushing him back when he covers her mouth with his own.

Flashes of Thomas rutting on top of her and Tate crying after blur through her mind, but in the end she knows there's no justifying why, instead of wretching back and telling him to, "go away!" she opens her mouth for him when his hands find her zipper and carefully drags it down the center of her back.

* * *

><p>Violet curls and clenches their twined fingers and pushes back with his every thrust, her head bowed to watch him work between her legs. He feels heavy inside of her and she feels full in a way she never can when they're apart. She revels in the way his chest slip-slides over her back, focuses in on how his forearms frame hers and how his teeth feel as they carve down her nape.<p>

"I love you," he's saying again, with barely any strength at all, the rhythm of his thrusts stuttering into little more than the frantic want of their hips.

She doesn't respond until after she comes with a bitten-off cry and he tips over the edge too with a low growl, and even then, when he's slumped over her on the bed, his fingers carding through her hair as he breathes against her ear, she half-hopes it's too quiet for him to hear.

"Don't love me too much."

* * *

><p><strong>AN: **Thanks for reading! I've started reading 'The Witching Hour' by Anne Rice and the part when Lasher cries at Deirdre's bedside when she won't look at him totally reminded me of Tate so I had to write this. Also, I just really love melancholic stories.


	3. Chapter 3

When Violet wakes up the next morning, he's already watching her. She mumbles awake, face in her pillow, and he tucks back a thick lock of hair to find her eye open.

"Morning," he smiles sleepily, twisting an arm around her back to tip her closer.

It smells like sex and sweat inside her room, and for a blissful moment, she doesn't know why. She doesn't understand him being there either, with her in bed, but just brushes it off as a dream and lets herself take stock of his fingers drawing designs up her spine. His eyes are soft for once, looking more like soil than obsidian, and she considers reaching up to trace his eyelashes, but curls her fingers around the corner of the pillow instead.

She had dreams like this often, where she'd just wake up or turn into a room and he'd be there. But never before had she remembered him so well. He looked perfect, right down to the shape of his teeth peeking out from behind bowed lips.

This time she doesn't stifle the urge to touch him, plucks drowsily at the chapped flesh and lets her fingertips skitter over his stubble.

"I didn't know you had to shave," she exhales curiously, and it sounds like a smile. He keeps still for her timid exploration. Brushing her knuckles up the cut of his cheek, she tacks on an absent comment about how he feels like sandpaper which evokes a low chuckle from Tate, who in turn catches her wrist and presses his lips to the center of her palm.

"How's your head?" His voice is strangely rough, like he's been crying, but in dreams like this - the good ones - there were never tears, perhaps the only time they were spared from such quiet torment.

Considering his question, rolling her eyes like she might look back into her own skull and deduce what's wrong, her fingers walk down his throat and shoulder.

"Mm, fuzzy," she decides after a moment, squinting each eye in turn, shying away from the glare pouring in her windows. Through each view, she notes his expression, one of apprehension veiled by a smile, and wonders why this dream feels different. But rather than dissect the niggling feeling, she snuggles up into her ghost boy's chest and presses a kiss to his adam's apple.

Tate draws the blankets up over her shoulders and sifts through her hair with long fingers. It's nice.

"Looks like rain, little love," he hums, chin propped against her crown, peering up through her sheer curtains at the sky; the sun's been smothered by clouds that seem to grow darker with every passing minute. She makes a noise that she's heard him, but doesn't have words right now to respond, doesn't need them. Not here.

In her dreams of Tate there are no 'I'm Sorry's or even any 'I Love You's. It's just him and her spending time together without the weight of their past, or his. They read books and have picnics and love on each other, but they don't have words.

That's when the spell breaks, when she remembers. All at once, while she's leaning into the rasp of his jaw against her cheekbone and he's mapping out the shell of her ear, the events of the previous night wash over her in freezing clarity.

A still of Tate, mouth open and eyes closed, panting over her shoulder flashes through her consciousness.

No. No no no no.

She chokes in a gasp and stiffens in his arms, doe eyes wide with the realization of what they'd done, but before she can pull out of his embrace, he's gripping her shoulders and trapping her with him in the bed.

"Don't. Please, Violet, don't." His eyes read terrified and for a beat all she can do is gape at him, fighting against the pounding headache that's just made itself known before she's overwhelmed by her own fear.

She'd promised herself that this would never happen again. That she would never fold into his arms again, that she wouldn't let herself re-break their hearts again. Because despite the way his tangible love soothes her soul, the fact still remains that he's dead and she's not. He'll never be eighteen. He'll never meet her at the bar for a beer or be her date to a wedding. She'll never get to introduce him to her friends and he'll never take her on a date. A night of coming together won't change all that.

"Tate, let me go," she mouths, her voice little more than a silent grimace, but he doesn't, only holds her more firmly and scrambles for words.

But nothing will make her stay, and he submits to this learned truth after a few more whimpers of his name that grow in volume and urgency.

"Alright, fne," he snaps, releasing her, pushing at her shoulders with his palms when she doesn't clamber out of bed the second he unshackles her. He reels in his fresh anguish and smothers it with irritation. "Go."

She's taken back by his shift in composure, having expected hot tears rather than a sharp tongue. His cold expression cuts her deep, has her feeling crushed by the weight of her guilt for hurting him again.

"I'm..." She opens her mouth to finish his favorite phrase, has a vicious urge to crawl back to him and burrow under his skin, but concludes that the damage is done and slips out of bed without feeding him another futile word.

She feels his eyes on her as she quickly walks over to a crumpled towel on the floor and wraps herself up to save him from the sight of her without clothes. It's unbearable.

Her guilt is crippling. Her bones are made of lead. She thinks she might sink into the floorboards before she makes it across the rest of her bedroom and out the door. Maybe the house should just swallow her up now. She deserves it. And with the way things are going, with how fucking weak she's been lately, it's really only a matter of time anyway.

He won't follow. She knows that much. She'll be able to shower in peace, to wash away the ghosts of his fingers without wondering if he's watching. And when she comes back to her room he'll be gone. The bed will be made and the window will be open, but he won't be reading in her chair or flipping through her iPod. She'll be alone.

She falters at the closed door with one hand clutching the handle. Holding her towel up, she bows her forehead against the smooth wood and feels tears drop down onto her bare feet.

"Dammit, Tate," she breathes out hopelessly, her eyes fisted shut so tight it feels like there are needles in her temples. But she doesn't mind. She wants to hurt. She deserves to.

He's silent behind her. It makes her feel foolish. She can imagine him sitting up in her bed, the sheets pooled at his waist and his hair a mess; her broken boy.

"I fucked up. I'm sorry." Her apology is tiny.

The staggered intake of breath is unmistakable and now she can imagine his tears too. Will she ever stop hurting him?

Before either of them break down into debilitating sobs, Violet steps back from the door then and wretches it open. It takes what little strength she's got left to keep from stealing one last glance of her Tate, but she manages and, not daring to even breathe lest she give in, Violet darts out into the hallway and towards the bathroom.

Throwing closed the door to spare her any final glimpse of him, she sheds her towel and has just enough time to drop down onto her knees and flip open the toilet lid before she's hunched over retching up bile.

What haunts her worse than having him between her legs last night is the fact that, even now, in the aftermath, she wants for him so badly. For just the feel of him under her hands, or even of just his breath warm against her cheek.

It's always like this afterwards, like he's dipped both hands inside her rib cage and pried it wide open, leaving an expansive gape she's hopeless to fill again. The pain fades with time though, from an unbearable whinging to a dull ache that never really disappears.

Panting into the bowl between fits, Violet vows that she will swear off drugs and alcohol, at least until her birthday next month. It's when she's under the influence that she's able to forget, but it's also then that she slips up and finds him.

The shower water heats up fast and as soon as she dares, she steps under the scalding spray. It eats at her scalp and sears down her spine, but she's happy for the burn. It takes her mind off the fact that he'd saved her life under this spray years ago. That his love had consumed her in a different way once. That he wasn't her damnation only.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: **Hey guys! Thanks for reading. Had another off day and put it into this. Just FYI, there may never be resolution in this fic. I just really like writing the soft sadness of this Violate. Next chapter will be at her birthday party. xx


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N: **Hey guys! Feeling really melancholy today, which means a new chapter of this depressing fic. Posting at 4AM and unbeta'd so if it's awful, sorry!

Happy holidays!

* * *

><p>Tate's bitter dismissal from their morning after haunts Violet. He'd never been angry with her like that before. It was a breaking point she'd begun to doubt existed with him. His devotion was bottomless, his love, bottomless. An ocean for her to dip into whenever the real world was too much.<p>

Hearing the raw betrayal in his voice rattles her inside out.

She sleeps on the couch downstairs and wears the clean clothes stacked in the laundry room she hadn't gotten around to taking up. She doesn't want to go back to her room; the crime scene that it is, has been.

Her dad doesn't ask when he wakes her with the tv every morning; on some level, he must know.

She can't keep food down. There are mugs half-emptied of tea all over the house, but the fridge and cupboards are swollen.

When she hasn't ventured upstairs in over a week, phone dead on her desk, and still isn't sleeping through the night, Violet vows to make a change.

Hair tied up, in sweats and a v-neck, she pops up onto the kitchen counter with her phone, a pad of paper, and a steaming cup of earl grey.

Twenty minutes later, teeth marks up and down her pencil, she's made tentative plans to find an apartment with one of her friends, Allison, from the dorms before the spring semester starts.

She knows someone who can get her a job at the library on campus, but if she asks, Ben will fork out her half of the rent. His disappointment at losing her company is obvious, but he still tries for encouraging.

"That sounds great, Vi," he'd agreed, rubbing at her back when she'd told him, smiling for the first time in days.

Violet should have done this at the start. She was a fool to think living here with Tate would end any other way. It still hurts to breathe, knowing he's everywhere.

The next morning, she goes apartment hunting with Allison. They find the perfect place by late afternoon, a two bedroom close to campus with a laundry room attached.

That weekend, after two trips to Ikea and a meeting with their parents to co-sign on the place, Violet is standing in her room for the first time in two weeks.

Working fast, she's packed most everything she needs in two hours. There are towers of boxes out by the stairs for Ben to haul down, labeled in colored sharpies.

Sitting on her bare mattress, Violet flops back and lets loose a soft breath, touching absently at the heart-shaped locket around her neck.

With all the sudden excitement of moving, she's been distracted from what's driving her out of this room, house.

Violet wonders if he's here, if he even knows. She sits up, surveying empty shelves and hangers. In one side of her closet, alone, hangs the pink strapless dress from the last time they touched.

Something about seeing it there, limp and wrinkled in the weak light of morning, is triggering.

Out of nowhere, Violet is sobbing. She curls in on herself, cross-legged, and screams out into her hands.

He doesn't come like he would have, once.

She cries herself hysterical, taking huge gulps of air to keep from passing out, the air jagged and stinging on every breath she drags in.

"I'm sorry!" she chokes, gripping at the rail of her footboard and doing her level best to warp it. Her knuckles go white and she presses her forehead against cool iron between her hands when it doesn't give.

The room feels like it is folding in on itself. Despite her fisted eyes, he stares at her in every detail. He's in the wood grain of the floorboards, in the dried drips of paint at her windowsill, the brushed reflection of these bars.

She can hear him asking about her scars, and telling her that he likes birds. Laughing with her at videos on youtube, playing tic-tac-toe on her chalkboard.

This is why she has to leave. She is a prisoner here, trapped forever by this perfect, horrible boy she's made a prisoner too. A slave to her.

Violet doesn't pull herself together until the stairs creak under her father's footfalls.

"I'll meet you down by the car!" she rushes out, swiping at her face, forcing out one unsteady breath, two.

Her heart hiccups, beats wildly like a bird with a broken wing, but she gets up. She closes up the last box on her bed and hefts it into her arms.

She slips into her furred flats and leaves the room without anymore fanfare. Enough is enough.

But when she's out the door with the last of her things, and the movers are packing up the van, she can't help but wonder why he didn't come out to say goodbye.

* * *

><p>Allison goads her into having their housewarming party that night, before they've even finished unpacking. Violet gets most of the kitchen done and the tv in the family room hooked up while Allison is out getting the drinks.<p>

When she comes home with an armful of assorted vodkas and a value size bag of skittles, there are already people crowding inside and out onto the patio for a smoke.

Three Taste-The-Rainbow shots later, Violet is braving the cold to share a cigarette with a boy on the lacrosse team at school.

His name is Isaac and she kinda-sorta already knows him, one of Allison's friends from high school.

He has blonde hair in wired curls, but his eyes are blue not black. Downing another shot that's been set out on the patio railing, It's enough of an excuse for her to believe she's not out here because there's a resemblance.

"Want to give me the tour?" he asks, all troublesome eyebrows and secret smile.

Violet nods, because she really, really does.

Inside, they get corralled into a round of beer pong, another round of shots, and a game of King's Cup, but by the end of the night Violet and Isaac are a mass of sweaty limbs in her room.

They christen the apartment, twice.

Isaac fucks like he talks, sweet but with an edge. He doesn't go for doggie or confess a phony latex allergy. And he even wakes her up to let her know he's leaving. She cranes her neck for a polite goodbye kiss and is asleep again before he's even out the door.

Yeah, she can do this. She can go cold turkey and survive. Tate won't haunt her here.

* * *

><p>Classes start up at the tail end of January, after a string of kickbacks that result more than once in Isaac spending over.<p>

Ben visits and takes her out. She never goes home.

Violet takes all morning classes so that she can be home for lunch and back to campus for work after.

The library is easy. She spends evenings combing through the aisles with go-backs and is blissfully alone.

Overall, life is beginning to feel easy again. There are some days that are hard, when Ben calls sounding lonely or she's sent back with a book about birds or filled with Romantic poets. But with long nights of homework, and her friends, Violet starts wondering if happiness might be in the cards for her afterall.

Then she discovers it.

One weekend in February, bundled up in sweater leggings and one of the team sweatshirts Isaac left behind the night before, Violet is finally getting around to setting up her room.

She gets an amused, "Are you serious?" from Allison when she pulls out the disembodied doll head from her desk back home, but tucks it into her bookshelf anyway.

There's just two boxes left, some shirts that had fallen behind her headboard. She frowns. The shirts in the first box are all wrinkled and sour-smelling.

"Dirty!" she calls, and Allison magically appears in the hallway, laundry basket in hand. Violet makes a 3-pointer and two misses, and then turns back to her unpacking.

She peels open the flaps of her last box, the finish line in sight, and has to cover her mouth at what confronts her.

There, folded up neatly at the top of the pile, is one of Tate's sweaters, striped yellow and brown and just as threadbare as she remembers.

If Allison weren't in the next room, Violet would lose it. She wants to. Her body is shaking with the effort it takes to keep everything in. Instead she reaches out with one leg and toes her door closed, then carefully, like it might wither to dust in her hands, lifts the sweater up out of its box and presses her face into the knitted pattern.

"Tate," she wheezes silently, curling her fingers into the material of it, taking deep lungfuls of its scent. Like fresh dirt and Big Red and him.

She clutches it to her chest, fingers the stretched loose collar, and cries. Then, a moment later, surges up onto her feet to tear off Isaac's sweatshirt, burnt by the betrayal it represents.

"I'm so sorry," Violet whispers, walking back to sit with Tate's sweater on her bed. "I didn't know what else - I'm so sorry, Tate."

She falls asleep there, arms threaded into its sleeves, and wakes up exhausted after dark.

* * *

><p>By the time her birthday party rolls around at the end of March, she's wearing the sweater to bed every night, but has started taking Isaac's calls again.<p>

Violet's birthday ends up on a Thursday this year, so Allison makes the executive decision to throw her shindig the weekend before. "It's going to be perfect, princess!" she'd squealed, wielding dimples Violet has never been fit to deny anything.

She sets out a grey babydoll dress with a white collar and thigh-high black sweater socks that night while Allison flits around putting rollers in her hair.

They strut around the apartment in undies, answering texts about who's bringing drinks and arguing over where to order pizza.

Violet motions for Allison to zip her while on the phone with Isaac. "No gifts," she says sternly, but she's smiling, pulling on her socks and mary janes.

Everything goes great.

People come, they toast to her throughout the night, let her pick all the games. Isaac shows up with a bouquet of lilies and finds a vase in the kitchen. Pandora plays all her favorite songs, and Isaac even swings with her on the coffee table.

It's not until she's sidling up with a friend of a friend to do a line when things go to shit.

"What are you doing?" Isaac demands, suddenly there and looking pissed.

Violet blinks up at him owlishly, crooked smile stitched to her face. "What does it look like?"

He makes an irritated noise and brushes her perfect line down onto the carpet to a room of boos, and then yanks her up by the wrist and drags her back into her room.

"Are you fucking serious, Violet?"

Her high dips. She just stares up from where he's deposited her on the bed and shrugs.

It's not the response Isaac had been hoping for. A bitter laugh pops out of him and he sits down next to her.

"Are you a junkie?" he asks baldly.

She fits him with a cutting glare. "Fuck you." He doesn't know shit about her. And for the record, one line does not a junkie make.

He smiles, but it's tight and unhappy, and then spots the sweater in her sheets. 'What's this?"

Violet's eyes go wide and she tears it out of his hands. "Don't touch it!" She hugs it to her chest and whispers something unintelligible into the collar.

Isaac rolls his eyes and gets up from the bed. "And I thought I was fucked up." He walks over to the corkboard she's got hanging over her desk and lets his eyes roam over the pictures pinned there without ever really seeing any.

"Why aren't we dating?" he asks without turning back a minute later, his real reason for acting like a prize asshole. She hasn't let him call her his girlfriend yet.

Violet lays back to stare at the ceiling. She can't look at him with his hands in his hair like that.

She's silent, just picks at the thumb hole of Tate's sweater, and at some point Isaac leaves.

She doesn't come back out for the rest of the party. She kicks off her shoes and burrows under the covers and wishes Tate had a cellphone. She'd give anything to hear his hello.

* * *

><p>The week doesn't go uphill from there. After a weekend long hangover, she bombs a midterm and sleeps through her alarm. Allison picks a fight with her about the dishes.<p>

Tuesday she finds Isaac kissing some other girl with blonde hair and a mean smile. It's not a big loss, but stacked up on everything else, she cries.

She's bone-deep tired and feeling low, sick of college life and being away, so when Ben asks if he can cook her up something for her birthday dinner, she agrees.

* * *

><p>Thursday is stubbornly cold, winter back for one last jibe before spring sets in.<p>

Violet stays warm in layered thermals and tights under a knitted skirt and zip booties. Allison got her the shoes and skirt for her birthday. In varying shades of black just like your soul, the card had read, with a smiley face tacked on at the end. The box was left on the couch. Apparently their kitchen feud is over.

On the drive over, she frets a little over Tate, but rationalizes that it's just dinner. In and out, no time for any encounters with the undead.

There are balloons wrapped around the mailbox in her honor. She has to smile at that.

"Hi Dad." They share a warm hug and after toeing off her shoes, Ben ushers her inside.

He's prepared chicken parmigiana with broccoli and garlic bread, one of Violet's favorites. It's delicious.

They share a bottle of wine, even though she isn't legal yet, and catch up. Ben tells her that he's seeing someone, a young woman that works at the bank, and Violet talks a little about Isaac. Even though it's over, she doesn't want her dad worrying that there isn't someone out there taking care of her. She feels a little sad, but really, it had been unfair from the beginning. There will never be a clean slate with any boy she meets. Unaware, he will always be in competition.

After dinner, feeling soggy and content, Ben lets her pick out something to payperview. They watch Chronicle together and when the credits roll, Violet wakes her father and puts the empty popcorn bowl in the sink.

She's sleepy from the movie and still a little buzzed, so when he kisses the top of her head and tells her one last happy birthday, she warns him that she might just pass out on the couch and head home in the morning.

Alone in the house, feeling only a little guilty that she doesn't do this with her dad more often, Violet rolls down her tights and steps out of her skirt, folding them up on the coffee table. Then she's curling up and pulling the heavy blanket down off the back of the couch.

Allison texts asking if she'll be home and they chat a little and halfway through an episode of Friends, Tate walks into the living room.

All the air is sucked from her lungs.

"Hi Violet," he says quietly, not quite looking at her, and with a trembling hand, she motions for him to have a seat.

He moves to the armchair, but doesn't sink in, just sits tensely at the edge.

She turns down the tv until it's nothing but white noise, and smiles, but it's weak. "Hi Tate."

"Happy Birthday."

Her smile grows. It's good to hear his voice. She bows her head in thanks. Small talk should come after, and it's there at the tips of their tongues, but she's content with silence. They sit together in the blue glow of the television and just look.

He's just the same. A sweater and jeans. Blonde and messy-haired. Violet wonders if she looks any different.

As though he's heard her thoughts, he says, "Your hair's gotten so long," marvels at it.

"Thanks."

"How was your birthday?"

She frowns, shakes her head. "Pretty shitty."

"I'm sorry."

The air between them is charged, but it isn't frantic anymore, just a low hum that sits in her ears. And Tate isn't reaching for her, or crying, he's just there. Watching her through the dark, wanting to hear about her life.

"Are you..."

"Seeing anybody?" she finishes for him, "no. Well, I was, but it was never serious."

He doesn't collapse at the news, just nods solemnly and fidgets with his hands in his lap.

Violet's pulse is scary fast and her stomach feels tight, but she's glad he's here. She's missed him, wants to tell him so.

"I miss you," she says flat out, like she can't keep the words in, and he makes that noise, the tiny broken hum he'd made when she first told him she loved him all those years ago. It's like watching a knick spider out over a windshield. He's trying so hard to be good for her, but it's too much. She knows.

He smiles, tight-lipped, and she can't take it. He's young and dead and she's young and alive, but they've got love so deep for each other that maybe it doesn't even matter. Maybe it will never matter enough. She won't ever snuff out the flame he sparked. It will lick at her insides forever, raging and untamed. And growing up while he stays the same will be hard, but this is hard. Staying away from him is too hard.

No more substitutes.

Without a word, Violet gets up and drops the blanket. She carries herself across the rug to Tate on shaky legs and folds down into his lap when he opens his arms for her.

"I always miss you," she whispers against his hair, letting the first tears fall now that she's here, and he hugs her to his chest.

"Me too," he says, and his voice is thick but he isn't crying. His hands are starfished out across her back and he drops his face to hide it in her shoulder, but he isn't crying.

Violet holds onto him like he might disappear. She digs her fingers into his curls and hugs his waist with her knees. Presses her lips all over the side of his face, anywhere she can reach, grabs at his sweater to check that he's real. "Why'd you let me go?" she cries, picking his face up in her hands, forcing him to look at her.

His eyes are so sad now, red and shining, but he just shrugs, looking tired. "I had to."

She cries harder, shoulders shaking with it, and cinches both arms around his neck to keep them touching everywhere.

Violet has a world out there, a life with friends and teachers, goals. Tate has Violet, that's all. His world walks and talks, and can leave. Has left.

He should hate her for how she's treated him. And she's been so scared that he might. That their last fuck up together broke the spell. But he's still hugging her, whining out breathy noises into her neck, voice breaking on them, and she knows. He could never.

They remain entwined on the couch until Violet is sniffles instead of sobs. Tate tucks back her hair and she gives him her eyes.

"Hey."

She smiles, gaze snagged on his mouth. "Hi," she whispers. And then they're kissing and it's so easy. Slow and burning, she opens up for him and sucks at his tongue, rubbing circles against the skin behind his ears.

His hands smooth up and down her sides, restless. She bites at his jaw, his ear, the angle of his adam's apple.

They're feasting, but it's reverent. Each touch and every sound is recorded. It feels like the last time.

Violet stands between Tate's knees and shimmies out of her panties before helping with his jeans, and when he's out of them and his boxers, hard and leaking for her, Violet piles back onto his lap.

She sinks down onto him, unable to wait and tease, and whispers, "I'm sorry," into his slackened mouth, gripping onto his shoulders for leverage. He's watching her through slitted eyes and shakes his head, bites his fingers into her hips and guides her, faster, more.

Her knees are rubbed raw against the cushions and their thighs are slippery with sweat, but it's perfect.

They're kissing when she comes, breaking away from his mouth with a bitten cry, pleasure shocking through her as Tate rides through it, juddering up into Violet one last time before his own orgasm hits.

After, he makes to move them, but she makes an unhappy sound. "Please," Violet sighs, rolling her hips. She just wants to feel him for a little while longer.

He laughs quietly and kisses her again, her cheek, her chin, her lips.

In the morning, they're curled up together in a tangle of blankets on the couch.

Violet's alarm is so unwelcome, she wants to chuck it out into the foyer.

She slips out from under his arm and dresses quietly, only waking him when she's pulling on her last sock. "I'm gonna be late for class," she whispers through a smile, stroking the backs of her fingers down the edge of his face. Tate's nose wrinkles and he turns into the cushion with a grumble. But a second later, he's up, trailing Violet over to the door.

He pulls her in for a kiss by her scarf and checks to be sure her bag is buttoned.

She hums against his mouth and doesn't pretend this was a mistake. She tries to soak in one last embrace and holds him there for a few seconds too long in the doorway. Why does letting go hurt this much?

"I wish I could take you with me," she confesses, mouth at his ear. He stiffens, but relaxes just as quickly, soothing her with a hand on her back.

"Call me sometime," he says, and his voice wobbles. He nods over at the phone though, and she looks.

"Yeah, yeah I will."

He lets her go then, but has to give her a nudge off the porch. "Go," he says, "don't wanna be late."

She wipes her face off in the bend of her elbow and laughs. She could give a shit. But still, she goes, with one last lingering kiss, she goes.

Tate waves from the door when she's starting up the car, and her heart splinters. But she's coming back. For visits, and maybe, after graduation, if her heart isn't set on anything else, Violet will move back into Murder House.

Permanently.

* * *

><p><strong>AN: **Thanks for reading! And Violet's friends were definitely not characters from teen wolf (spoiler alert: yes they were). This might be the last chapter of this. I kind of resolved it! Love you all! xx


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